The use of Public-Private Partnerships (PPPs) by governments on all continents has been rapidly growing as government departments and their agencies continue to look for improvised means of providing high quality services. In South Africa, the demand for the replacement of the aging government infrastructure has led to the increase in the use of PPPs. The PPPs are not only used for the improvement of roads, but also in the provision of social services and many other services that are traditionally a responsibility of government. Government institutions typically enter into relationships with PPPs to address their needs and to meet specific objectives. It is, therefore, up to these institutions to choose an ideal model of procurement that best addresses their objectives of delivering effective services (Palmer, 2009:Online). Government institutions will, however, only enter into relationship with PPPs if the services can be transferred in a responsible way and if the risks for failure are limited. Inefficiencies in the disbursement of social assistance grants by the South African Social Security Agency (SASSA) has received much attention and criticism from the stakeholders as the company contracted to perform the work on behalf of SASSA continues to provide poor quality services. In assessing a PPP, countries providing social security transfers need to take into consideration a partner that will assist in establishing and implementing the payment design and distribution mechanism that is capable of facilitating the cost effective, reliable and practical delivery of cash to the grant beneficiaries. A comprehensive review of literature and empirical investigation was carried out to respond to the research study’s set objectives. The study explored a wide-ranging survey of PPP projects in developed and developing countries focusing on the use of the PPP model in the South African context with specific reference to the disbursement of social grants by the SASSA. Alternative procurement methodologies in government were also reviewed. An analysis of relevant procurement theories was undertaken to form the basis of the research study. The mini-dissertation explores if there are any advantages for the government, and more specifically the SASSA, in using PPPs as opposed to traditional procurement methods. The study attempts to establish if a private partner can be encouraged to provide long-term investment in terms of expertise; well qualified staff; technology; infrastructure; and creation of an environment conducive for highly effective service delivery where the return on such investment is not guaranteed. / MA (Public Administration), North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2015

Master of Science / Department of Family Studies and Human Services / Karen S. Myers-Bowman / The current study focuses on qualitative data collected from youth and adults in two rural Kansas communities. The focal point of analysis was youth and adults' answers to questions about their experiences working with one another within community-based programs, specifically questions regarding youth's feeling of empowerment within the context of the program. Lerner's theory of developmental contextualism provided a framework for understanding how youth-adult relationships contribute to the development of youth empowerment. Youth voice, a construct related to the youth empowerment literature, appeared in the participants' responses across program sites. Common themes across settings were that teens who had been involved in the program the longest felt especially empowered, that youth became more responsible as a result of participating in the program, and that adults in both program sites fulfilled the six adult roles for youth empowerment that have been established in the research literature. Finally, three constructs significant in the youth development literature (confidence, connection and compassion) emerged as themes in relation to the experiences of the young people in the program. Implications of this study include exploring the impact youth-adult relationships have on adults and investigating how teens as role models or mentors for "littles" impact their feeling of empowerment. Suggestions for replication of this study are also given.

Cette recherche a eu pour but principal de montrer, à travers l’exemple de l’industrie informatique dans les années 90, que la stratégie de partenariat est aujourd’hui devenue un outil essentiel pour permettre aux entreprises à la tête d’une industrie à forte innovation technologique, confrontée à des changements structurels importants, et en particulier à la désintégration menant au leadership technologique partagé, de maintenir leur position dominante. Les quatre parties du travail constituent une suite logique d’étapes contribuant chacune à valider la thèse: la partie I porte sur la synthèse des principaux courants de la littérature scientifique sur les accords de collaboration et leur relation avec l’évolution des industries. Le but poursuivi dans la partie II est de décrire les changements intervenus dans l’industrie informatique au cours des années 90 et de formuler l’hypothèse d’une relation entre ces changements et la stratégie des firmes dans le domaine des accords de collaboration. Cette hypothèse est vérifiée empiriquement dans les parties III et IV à l’aide d’une banque de données sur les accords de collaboration. La partie III du travail présente les résultats descriptifs et la partie IV les résultats analytiques permettant de valider l’hypothèse.

The School-to-Work Opportunities Act of 1994 provided seed monies to educational institutions, if they were willing to form collaborative partnerships with members of the business and employer communities. The goal was to build learning opportunities for students that would facilitate their seamless transition from the public school system into adult work-settings and/or places of post-secondary education, training, and skills acquisition. An historical case study of school reform was conducted, using qualitative research methods that included extensive field observations, participant interviews, document analysis, narrative inquiry strategies, phenomenological reflection and data reduction. The lived experiences of 23 students and 14 community partners were juxtaposed against the recollected memories of the teacher-researcher, and analyzed in the context of complex change theory (Ambrose, 1987). The point was to distill the essential themes that could shed light on the research question. Those factors that were deemed to be influential in the development, delivery, or efficacy of the learning opportunities that were created as curriculum interventions, in support of this one piece of federal legislation, are discussed analytically, so as to make recommendations for similar practical programs with a career-education or work-based learning focus.

This thesis articulates how the Kuh-Ke-Nah network (K-Net) shaped broadband development in remote indigenous communities. K-Net operates under the not-for-profit stewardship of Keewaytinook Okimanak (KO) Tribal Council. Located in Northwestern Ontario, KO brought K-Net to life amongst its six member First Nations in the mid 1990s. As K-Net evolved and expanded its membership, KO established a governance model that devolves network ownership and control to community networks in partner First Nations. This governance model reflects KO’s use of social enterprise to organize K-Net’s community-based broadband deployment amidst necessary partnerships with government programs and industry players. K-Net’s social enterprise has rapidly grown since 1997, when its core constituents fought for basic telephone service and internet access in Northern Ontario. In the space of less than a decade, K-Net communities have gone from a situation in which it was common for there to be but a single public payphone in a settlement, to a point where over thirty now have broadband internet services to households. Technologies now under K-Net control include a C-Band satellite transponder, IP videoconferencing and telephony, web and email server space, and a variety of terrestrial and wireless links that effectively connect small, scattered First Nations communities to each other and the wider world. K-Net’s governance model encourages member communities to own and control community local loops and internet services under the authority of a local enterprise. Community ownership and control over local loops allows First Nations to collaborate with KO to adapt broadband applications, such as telemedicine and an internet high school, to local challenges and priorities. K-Net’s aggregation of demand from disparate users, within and across member communities, creates economies of scale for the network’s social enterprise, and allows a dynamic reallocation of bandwidth to meet social priorities. Based on four years of research with K-Net stakeholders under the Canadian Research Alliance for Community Innovation and Networking (CRACIN), my thesis documents the evolution of K-Net’s governance model as a reflection of its social enterprise. Drawing from Community Informatics and the Ecology of Games, I trace K-Net’s history and organization to assess how KO, its partners, and K-Net’s constituents, cooperated to make social enterprise viable for member First Nations.

This dissertation presents an action research project carried out in a primary school to address the issue of ‘pupil voice’. Consulting with stakeholders has risen in prominence in the political context of schools. A number of government directives to encourage schools to engage have been put forward, including the expectation of the establishment of a School Council. The formation of the School Council is the first cycle of action presented in this dissertation, which then continues to develop through three further action cycles: listening to the voices of teachers, ‘children as philosophers’ and action research partnerships in the classrooms. Preliminary work prior to the introduction of School Council sets the context. The conceptual framework has been developed through consideration of the work of Shier (2001), Fielding (2001) and Hart(1994) which has contributed to the establishment of a taxonomy of ‘pupil voice’ development. The methodological approach emerged from the works of Elliott (1991), Zuber Skerritt and Perry (2002) and Whitehead and McNiff (2006) through the development of ‘circles of influence’ which rose and diminished in importance throughout the action cycles. Three circles of influence are identified as ‘self’ including reflexivity, ‘methods’ including ways of engaging and analysing the data, and ‘literature’ pertinent to the area of action as well as the methodology itself. The contribution the subsequent thesis offers to practice is threefold. Firstly, there is the ‘methodological messiness’ (Dadds & Hart 2005) which occurs when conducting action research which necessitates listening to the voices of the participants in order to determine the next cycle. Secondly, there is the development of the ‘pupil voice’ taxonomy which embeds the pupils within the process and is groundbreaking in ‘pupil voice’ research in primary schools. Finally, there are the action cycles themselves which offer the lived experience of engaging in ‘pupil voice’ action research partnerships.

UNIVERZITA KARLOVA V PRAZE Husitská teologická fakulta Diplomová práce Possibilites of the social work on the support of the sexual and partnership of disabled people Vedoucí práce: Autor: PhDr. ThDr. Václav Mitáš, Th.D. Bc. Tomáš Drábek Praha 2011 Annotation The author of this thesis concerns the issues of charitable profession workers working with disabled people, in area of sexuality and partnerships. The workers tend to have wide knowledge in many disciplines, but in sexuality, which is so natural and closely related to the quality of life, are not instructed. According to the author, it is necessary to develop social workers' attitude towards sexuality during their professional training, and implicate a different behaviour towards persons with disabilities and their sexuality. Education in area of sexuality as well as disability studies should not be based on theoretical knowledge, but need to be conceived as a process of forming views at fundamental issues in this area. Therefore the aim of this thesis should be to declassify the topic of sexuality and to accept it as a natural part of life for everyone, including individuals with disabilities.

Le présent travail de recherche porte sur l’asymétrie des échanges interculturels dans les relations partenariales entre des organismes du Nord et du Sud. D’un tâtonnement exploratoire à la constitution d’un cadre d’analyse combinant plusieurs approches, cette recherche s’intéresse particulièrement aux partenariats entre des organisations non gouvernementales, des associations et des entreprises à but socioéconomique françaises et sénégalaises. L’analyse de ces relations partenariales se fait à trois niveaux : autour de l’acteur, ses logiques et les situations de coopération. Elle s’appuie sur des modèles théoriques et conceptuels notamment sur la problématique des rationalités, de la créativité des acteurs et des logiques de partenariat. Les relations partenariales s’inscrivent de ce fait dans ce qu’on pourrait appréhender comme un double mouvement de transaction socio-historique à la fois structurelle et structurale.En effet, le partenariat actuel entre organismes participe d’une métamorphose bien plus globale qui prend en compte les évolutions d’un monde en mutation permanente. Il résulte également d’un processus d’évolution des relations franco-sénégalaises.L’analyse des relations nouvelles et des alternatives de partenariat propose une sociologie des relations partenariales qui questionnent les discours et les pratiques de coopération dans le cadre d’échanges interculturels structurés et semi-structurés.L’analyse proposée permet ainsi de répondre à l’interrogation suivante : ces relations obéissent-elles à des logiques de domination, de réciprocité, de fraternalisme ou d’asymétrie ? / This research work focuses on the asymmetry of the intercultural exchanges within the partner relationships between the North and the South organizations. We particularly put emphasis on partner relationships between nongovernmental organizations and companies with a socio-economic vocation in France and in Senegal.The analysis of these partner relationships is done at three levels: on the partner, his logic and the cooperation situations. This relies on theoretical and conceptual models such as Weber’s (Weber M., 1964) comprehensive approach that emphasizes on rational actions, Boltanski’s, (Boltanski, 1990) normative action analysis model, Mauss’ (Mauss, 2007) reciprocal donation model, Joas’s (Joas H. , 1999) critical theory that highlights the creative nature that human actions have and Remy’s (Remy, 2005/1) social transaction theory. Partner relationships are then part of what could be tackled as a double issue of socio-historical transaction both structural and organisational. In fact, today’s partnerships between organizations are part of a much more global change taking into account the evolution of a permanently changing world. It thus arises on an evolution process of France-Senegal relationships. The analysis of new relationships and other partnership alternatives suggests a sociology of partner relationships that questions the today’s cooperation discourses and practices concerning structured and semi-structured intercultural exchanges. The analysis that we propose makes it possible to answer the following question: Do these relations follow a common sense of domination, reciprocity, fraternalism (Césaire, 1956) or asymmetry ?

A presente tese tem por propósito contribuir para uma política de planejamento no campo da educação a distância (EAD). Para isto concebe uma proposta multi-modelo de referência lastreada na definição de estratégias em espectro de alta complexidade, que considera uma seqüência de procedimentos sistematizados nas seguintes fases: (i) Determinação das necessidades de informação, em duas etapas: (a) identificação dos fatores críticos de sucesso (FCS) e (b) identificação das áreas de informação; (ii) Determinação das competências, em três etapas: (a) determinação dos conhecimentos, (b) determinação das habilidades, e (c) determinação das atitudes; (iii) Determinação dos graus de avaliação de competências; (iv) Determinação das estratégias em redes de conhecimentos. Evidencia-se a aplicação a um estudo de caso nas concessões rodoviárias no Brasil, na perspectiva das parcerias público-privadas (PPPs). A consecução da pesquisa foi por meio da intervenção de especialistas e um grupo pequeno de estudantes de um programa de EAD (MBA) aplicado às PPPs. A coleta de dados foi por meio de um formulário semi-estruturado, do tipo escalar, em uma matriz de julgamento, com a intervenção de especialistas. Vários instrumentos de apoio foram utilizados na elaboração da modelagem, com vistas a reduzir a subjetividade dos resultados alcançados: escalagem psicométrica - Lei dos Julgamentos Categóricos de Thurstone (LJC), Multicriteriais-Compromise Programinng, Electre III, e Promethee II; Análise Multivariada; Krigagem, Redes Neurais Artificiais (RNA); Redes Neurofuzzy. Os resultados produzidos mostraram-se satisfatórios, validando o procedimento proposto para EAD. Procedimento este, fundamental na definição de programas destinados para planejar a capacitação de recursos humanos a distância, bem como para a constituição de outros elementos do capital intelectual em políticas de EAD. / This thesis intends to contribute to the planning guidelines in the field of distance education (DE). Thus, it develops a multi-model reference proposal supported by the definition of a highly complex spectrum of strategies that considers a sequence of systematic procedures in the following phases: (i) Determining the information needs in two stages: (a) identification of the critical success factors (CSF), and (b) identification of the information areas; (ii) Determination of competences in three stages, determining: (a) knowledge, (b) skills, and (c) attitudes; (iii) Determination of the degree of competence evaluation; and (iv) Determination of strategies in knowledge networks. There is the application to a case study of the road concessions in Brazil, within the perspective of public-private partnerships (PPPs). The research was achieved through the intervention of specialists and a small group of students from a DE program (MBA) applied to the PPPs. The data collection was conducted by means of a semi-structured form, the scalar type in a trial matrix, to which experts ascribed their assessments. Several support instruments were used in the modeling elaboration in order to reduce subjectivity in the results: psychometric scales - Thurstones Law of Comparative Judgment (LCJ), Multi-criteria Compromise Programming, Electre III, and Promethee II; Multivariate Analysis; Krigage, Artificial Neural Networking (ANN); Neuro-fuzzy networks. The results produced are satisfactory, validating the proposed procedure for DE. This is an essential procedure for the definition of programs designed to plan the training of human resources at a distance, as well as to establish other elements of intellectual capital for DE guidelines.

In today's society, we face many complex and major challenges, several of them concerning human rights - at both global, regional and local level. To enable solutions to these problems, collective action and effort is required. As a result, cooperation between all sectors within the UN, as well as the public and the private sector, not to mention civil society, is crucial. In September 2015, the UN General Assembly adopted a historic framework: Agenda 2030, which addresses the importance of partnerships and engagement from all sectors to achieve sustainable development and the application of human rights for all. In light of this, the present study investigates partnerships between the private and non-profit sector from a human rights perspective. Previous research has dealt with both cross-sector partnerships for social issues, the role of companies in relation to the Sustainable Development Goals, and CSR and human rights. The research about cross-sector partnerships for social issues, which are the partnerships that are addressed in Agenda 2030, often lacks the perspective of how they can promote human rights. The aim with this thesis is to therefore research how human rights are understood in cross-sectoral partnerships, in which ways these partnerships can promote human rights, as well as the successes and challenges that exist for them. The methodological design of this research consists of interviews with participants from partnerships between the private and the non-profit sector, with representatives from both sides. The present study shows that there is an interdependency between cross-sector partnerships and human rights and that it is clear that partnerships between different sectors are necessary to solve the social problems we are facing today. We need to partner for change.